


FUBAR

by bioticbootyshaker



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: AU, Multi, OT3, Virmire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-05 23:18:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/729042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bioticbootyshaker/pseuds/bioticbootyshaker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ash...</p><p>Alenko, she tried to whisper. Get the hell out of here already. Commander made her choice. She chose you. What the hell are you still doing here? She still couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe properly. She was broken, something pretty damn vital, and the most she could do was gurgle and wheeze.</p>
            </blockquote>





	FUBAR

_Ashley..._

She tried to speak and found her throat full of blood. She swallowed and tasted the hint of copper, sharp enough to focus her senses. Her eyes opened, slowly, her vision blurred. Ashley could see two faces above her, indistinct and shifting to grayness; she tried to reach up, shoo them away, tell them she was fine, or maybe cling to them, try to feel something substantial, but she couldn’t move. 

_Ash..._

_Alenko_ , she tried to whisper. _Get the hell out of here already. Commander made her choice. She chose you. What the hell are you still doing here?_ She still couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe properly. She was broken, something pretty damn vital, and the most she could do was gurgle and wheeze.

A hand took hers. The fingers were warm, softer than she thought they would be; softer than they had a right being given what they did to earn a paycheck. But Kaidan Alenko was full of surprises, full of inconsistencies and contradictions -- hard edges, soft lines, tender heart, sharp mind. She couldn’t get a handle on him, had never been able to, and when Kaidan pulled her hand up and pressed his mouth against her knuckles, Ashley was even more confused. 

_Watch it, lieutenant_ , she tried to say. _Gonna have to file a report_.

She coughed and flecked his face with blood. 

It certainly got her point across. 

****

“I’m fine, Skipper,” Ashley said. She didn’t give Shepard the chance to even speak or take a seat before she started. She’d been sitting in the med-bay for nearly a week, and she was feeling far too antsy and restless to bother with formalities. Besides, Shepard had never been good at small talk; she was a good friend and an even better commander, but she had the social graces of an inebriated moose. 

“Chakwas says she wants to keep you in bed for another week at least---”

“That’s bull,” Ashley blustered. She caught Shepard’s eyes -- hard, even when they were fringed with sympathy -- and bit her bottom lip. “I mean... I’m one hundred percent, Skipper, A-Okay, ready to go.”

Shepard smiled. She sat down beside Ashley with a deep sigh. With everything she’d been through, it was easy to forget that Shepard had been pushing herself close to the breaking point. She was down a soldier, and as much as she liked to pretend she was strong enough to handle everything on her own, she was obviously feeling the stress of that. It was hard to imagine a woman like Shepard burning herself out, but the evidence was right in front of her. 

She was run-down, stitched together with an iron will and nothing much else. Ashley didn’t claim to know what was going on in Shepard’s head, least of all in her heart, but she thought what Shepard needed was a little time away from the fight. Just a moment or two to catch her breath and get some much needed rest. Of course there was no time for that, there wasn’t even a moment to spare in their fight. Saren wouldn’t stop to catch some vids out on the Citadel and play poker with his friends, so how could Shepard do anything less than him?

The best way to catch your enemy was to live as your enemy. Saren had unshakeable commitment to his cause -- no matter how batshit crazy it was -- and Shepard had to have the same kind of commitment to her own.

Even still...

“You look like hell, ma’am.”

Shepard laughed. It wasn’t her usual laugh -- the husky one that sent little shivers through Ashley’s stomach -- but it was good enough. It made her look... whole, at least, instead of looking patched together, worn and torn and just damn _tired_. 

“Thanks,” Shepard said. “So do you, Williams.”

Virmire had been a complete bust. They were running blind, which Ashley supposed was better than standing still, but only by an incredibly small margin. Saren was out there preparing to let the Reaper in right through their back door, and they were shooting in the dark, hoping their bullet hit their target. If Ashley looked terrible, it was only right; at least she looked like how she felt.

“You were going for Alenko,” Ashley said. It was the first time she’d said anything about the mission, anything about the decision Shepard had made. She was a soldier, and she knew the risks and the tough decisions involved; still, she was also a young woman, and she could feel the brunt of Shepard’s decision like a weight in her chest. It wasn’t that she blamed the woman, or even felt there was any blame to go around -- considering she was alive, it seemed pointless -- but she was curious how she had escaped Virmire when Shepard had been heading for Alenko.

“I was going for both of you,” Shepard said. “I don’t leave soldiers to die, Williams, not when I can help it. Even if I’d wanted to leave, Lieutenant Alenko wouldn’t come with me. He said he was going back for you. Said you owed him about a month’s salary worth of credits.” Shepard smiled and leaned back in her chair, fingers laced over her stomach and eyebrow raised. “You gambling on my ship, Chief?”

“Uh, well--”

“And you didn’t invite me,” Shepard said. She tsked and shrugged. “So, you can thank Alenko, I guess. He wouldn’t leave you behind. I wasn’t too thrilled with the idea, either, you understand? The next time you wanna make a sacrifice, here’s an idea: don’t.”

That went against everything she had ever been taught, by her father _and_ the Alliance. A soldier had to be willing to make sacrifices, had to be willing to lay down on the grenade for his or her comrades. Otherwise they were selfish, looking out only for their own hides, leaving their friends and allies to die, abandoning a mission without giving it their all. Her father had always told her that the only way to judge a soldier’s merit was to look at the scars they wore; a soldier without scars was an anathema. 

And now Shepard wanted her to feel sorry for being willing to lay down her life for the good of the mission and her own team? The Reapers were coming, that much was for certain, and if the stories about them could be believed, Ashley seriously doubted the universe would have enough time or concern to spare for one dead Gunnery Chief.

“Skipper--”

Whatever she meant to say was lost when the door to the med-bay slid open and Kaidan entered. He looked even worse than Shepard, like he hadn’t slept in a week or more. His hair was messy and disheveled, his face a roadmap of lines, his eyes glassy and weary. Ashley wasn’t used to him looking so unkempt; Alenko was a well put together guy; pressed and polished and neat with his hair swept back from his face and all of his buttons shining. 

The idea that it was her injuries that caused Kaidan so much distress was awful... but it was also pretty endearing. 

He was a handsome guy, after all. The kind of guy she wouldn’t mind taking a walk with. The kind of guy her dad would’ve liked, clean cut and polite and kind to the point of being a little irritating. 

Probably not the best time to be thinking like that. Or the best place. In fact, it was most likely wrong to think like that at _any_ time.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Shepard said. She stood and offered her seat to Kaidan, chuckling when they both balked and insisted she could -- she should -- stay. “No, I’ve got to get back to it,” Shepard said. “I’ll swing by later so we can talk more, Williams.”

“Thanks, Skipper,” Ashley murmured. “Just... Well, try and take it easy.”

Shepard gave her a crooked smile. Her eyes were hard but still ineffably tender. _Can’t do that, kiddo_ , they seemed to tell her, _You know that. Nothing easy about what we’re up against._

Of course Ashley knew, but that didn’t mean she wanted Shepard to run herself into the ground.

When she left, Kaidan took a seat and sat with his elbows on his knees. Once or twice he lifted his head, opened his lips like he meant to say something, and then closed them and looked down at his shoes. Ashley kept waiting for him to tell her that it hadn’t been her job to make the call, that she was too goddamn young to throw her life away, that he was her superior and if anyone had been meant to die back there, it had been him. She waited for the poison of those words to fall into her still healing wounds, but it never came. Instead, Kaidan reached out and took her hand, his thumb brushing over her knuckles.

“Gave me a scare back there,” he said. Not what he wanted to say, Ashley knew, but at least he was speaking. He still wouldn’t look at her, wouldn’t lift his chin from his chest or his eyes from his shoes. Ashley liked to think he was a little embarrassed with how he looked, but she guessed it had more to do with what Kaidan thought she might find in his eyes. Guilt, maybe, or an apology he didn’t have to make.

“Yeah, scared myself,” Ashley said. “Not really sure I’m ready to die, LT.”

Kaidan squeezed her hand. Gently, with more affection and tenderness than a friend should have shown. Ashley swallowed around a lump in her throat -- words she couldn’t say, or maybe her heart, she wasn’t really sure. Finally, _finally_ , Kaidan looked up at her, and she didn’t see guilt or apology in his dark eyes -- she saw something that was simultaneously better and worse.

Love.

What was she supposed to do with that? What was she supposed to say to such a pair of tender eyes? If she’d known Kaidan would end up tangling her up into such knots, she never would have gotten close to him; even as she thought it, Ashley knew it wasn’t true. She liked the guy, and there was no getting around that. Most people liked him, even if they found him a little overbearing and tight-assed -- which he was, but in a way that made him even more likeable. 

She never knew what she was thinking or feeling when Kaidan was close to her, and that felt dangerous. At the same time, it felt exciting, exhilarating, like what she’d been waiting for.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Kaidan said. “I was... Yeah, hey, let’s not do that again.”

“The Reapers get through, and we’re all dead,” Ashley said. “I did what I had to do. You wanted to do the same thing.”

“Right, yeah,” Kaidan said. “I know that. I just--- I’m sorry, Ash. You’re right. Can’t ask anything less from a soldier.”

“You’re damn right,” she said. She wanted to be indignant, yank his chain for a little while longer, but she was too tired to pretend she was upset. There was no fun in teasing a guy who looked like he was on the edge of some kind of breakdown. Ashley sighed and turned her hand under Kaidan’s, linking their fingers together. It felt good, maybe even a little right. When she met his eyes and held them she knew that it _was_ right, but what the hell was she supposed to say? What was she supposed to _do?_

“Commander was worried about you,” Kaidan said. “She’s not really one to talk about that stuff, but I could tell. She kind of has a soft spot for you.”

That was an even bigger can of worms that Ashley didn’t feel like opening. If Shepard had a soft spot for her, she had a funny way of showing it. Ashley doubted they’d ever had more than two or three conversations that hadn’t ended in some kind of fight or bickering. Shepard was a hard woman to get along with, mostly because Ashley thought they were too much alike; neither one of them knew when to back down, and neither one of them knew when to bite their tongues. It was just another wonderful personality trait she’d gotten from her dad.

But sometimes when Shepard looked at her---

No, it was too much to handle at once. Bad enough to have Kaidan there holding her hand and looking at her like he wanted to kiss her but wasn’t sure how; she didn’t need to add Commander Shepard to the fray.

“Well, I guess I’ll let you rest,” Kaidan said. 

When he stood, Ashley gripped his wrist.

“Hey,” she whispered. “Thanks.”

He never asked what she was thanking him for. That was a good thing, because Ashley honestly had no idea. Maybe she thanked him for coming back for her, for not leaving her behind, for holding out hope that she was still alive. Maybe she thanked him for holding her hand and sitting with her for a while.

Maybe it was just because he was Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko, and that was all he ever had to be.

****

“Hey, Williams.”

Ashley closed her locker, but she didn’t turn around. She didn’t want to meet Shepard’s eyes, which, given the tone of her voice, would probably be too damn naked for her to deal with. She preferred her raw emotion to be on the page, flowing in prose and poetry. When it came to her own lips, everything was jumbled and twisted up and messy. She couldn’t untie her tongue long enough to tell someone what they meant to her.

Shepard, though... She wasn’t one to talk about her emotions or to wear her heart on her sleeve, but you always knew where you stood with her. She was never afraid to put herself out there and let you know exactly what you meant to her, good and bad and everything inbetween.

“Hey, Skipper,” Ashley murmured. “You, uh, need me for something?”

Shepard touched her shoulder. Ashley stiffened, but let herself be turned around. She looked into Shepard’s eyes, and that was it, that was more than she could stand. If anyone wondered why Shepard was one of the most feared Commanders in the entire Alliance military, they only had to look into her eyes. Ashley had never seen so much heat and tenderness and severity and depth in someone’s eyes before. It felt like Shepard could make the earth shift and the sky shudder, and Ashley figured once you thought something like that, it was damn near impossible to convince yourself someone wasn’t important to you.

“Need you,” Shepard said. She smiled, crookedly, and let her fingers slide to Ashley’s neck. “Yeah, you could say that.”

“What for, ma’am?”

“Come up to my cabin tonight,” Shepard said.

“Oh.” Ashley laughed, scratching the back of her neck. She felt like an awkward teenage girl all over again; the one who had skinned knees and bruised knuckles. The one who looked at herself in the mirror and saw herself as a lion of war instead of the scrawny little sack of skin she’d actually been. 

“Need to send in our report about Virmire,” Shepard said. “Things went pretty FUBAR back there, and Hackett isn’t too happy about it. Asked Alenko to join us.”

Just what Ashley needed, the three of them closed up in a small room for an hour or so.

She was sure that would end well.

****

When she entered Shepard’s cabin, the first thing she noticed were the glasses and the bottle of wine sitting on the table. The second thing she noticed was how close Kaidan and Shepard were sitting. She could see Shepard’s hand at the back of his neck, her nails stroking and petting. Kaidan’s eyes were heavy-lidded, a little too lusty, and Ashley dropped them to look at her feet.

“Come on in, Williams,” Shepard said. Her voice was as lusty as Kaidan’s eyes, perhaps even a little lustier. Ashley swallowed, tried to find her voice, and could only offer a half-hearted laugh that sounded more nervous than humorous. 

“Ash,” Kaidan said. “Come on. It’s not like that, it’s just... Three friends sharing a drink.”

“Yeah,” Ashley said. “And what happens when it turns into more than that, LT? How’re we supposed to look at each other after that?”

“She’s right,” Shepard said. “It’d take some doing. Pretty sure if I saw either of you naked I’d have a hard time staying focused.”

Ashley felt her face heat up. “That’s not---”

“Relax, Williams,” Shepard chuckled. “Alenko’s right, it’s not like that. I just thought we could all use a drink after what happened.”

Ashley composed herself enough to sit down with them and have a glass of wine. She wasn’t sure why she was so bent out of shape -- it certainly wasn’t because she didn’t want them, both of them. She knew that she did, could feel it in her bones, hot and heavy in her lungs. She needed them, and that wasn’t something she admitted easily. Still, if someone found out, if there were reprimands, dishonorable discharges... Ashley had set out to clean up her family name, not drag it deeper into the mud.

“Hey,” Kaidan whispered. He reached over and rested his hand over her fingers. “It’s okay, Ash.”

She looked up and into his eyes. Yeah, it was okay. There was no way she could look into those pretty eyes and not think everything was okay. Shepard rested her hand on the side of Ashley’s throat, her fingers cool, slightly calloused, rough with years of fighting, with years of tightening over triggers and catching on heat sinks. Tender, though, terribly tender, and Ashley sighed -- submission, she guessed, though neither of them were asking her to. 

“Glad to have you with us, Chief,” Shepard murmured. “That’s all.”

Ashley turned and kissed Shepard’s wrist, right over her pulse; at the same time, her hand turned and gripped Kaidan’s, their fingers intertwining tightly. 

“Yeah,” Ashley said. “Damn good to be here, Skipper.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written for shiny-glor-chan on tumblr! They won my follower giveaway and I finally got around to writing their giftfic. This is embarrassingly late, and I feel terrible. ;A;
> 
> But Ash/Kaidan/Shep is my ot3 and so so lovely, so I hope it was worth the wait. :)


End file.
